I am a Cat Woman. My self-appointed mission in life is to save the feline world! To accomplish this mission, I get cats fixed. Perhaps my mission might be slightly delusional. This blog is a mishmash of wishful thinking, rants, experiences as I remember them and of course, cat stories and cat photos. I have a nonprofit now, to help keep the cats here cared for and to fix community cats. Happy Cat Club formed in 2015. Currently, we are on a mission to fix 10,000 cats.

Saturday, September 19, 2009

Exhaustion

I am exhausted. I was able to get Jeanne to the airport today and she flew back to Baltimore. That was after getting up at 5:30 a.m. to try to trap at the homeless camp for those two tiny kittens.

Shithead isn't dead. The young couple took him to a home, said he's in Salem now. I had been told they took him by the older guys, but when the pair across the creek said, seperately, they'd found him dead, I didn't know who to believe. I was glad to hear he's actually not dead.

But, I found out the young couple's new dog, a Ridgeback, attacked one of the kittens and had the poor little thing in its mouth. The young couple got the kitten away from the dog. N said he checked the kitten over before it scratched him and ran off, but I'm not so sure he's ok. They said his leg was bleeding. They said that was yesterday and they have not seen either tiny kitten since. I stayed for a few hours, but never saw any cats except the black male I took in to be fixed a couple weeks ago.

I had to park quite a distance away, then walk back to the camps. Wasn't easy on a tired out old gal, especially walking back with a trap all that way. I left out lots of food. Poppa's pres, Keni, had to cancel on coming to help, since she lost a cat, her old one, and has been out looking every night.

On the way back from taking Jeanne to the airport, I5 traffic was backed up forever, even on 205. It took me almost three hours to get home, as a result. The cause was heavy traffic combined with a huge motorcycle gang wreck on the northbound side. Bikes were littering the road, literally. A helicoptor also was landing by the time I passed the wreck, to life flight out at least one of the bikers. All were from what the paper described as an outlaw gang, in other words, a violent criminal behavior gang. Wonder how they felt about getting help from cops. Good for the cops helping them out. Wonder if that ever changes things.

I got called by a woman I helped out near Jefferson with getting 8 cats fixed. Their neighbors and friends were the ones who were starving their cats to death and I'd tried to get the cops involved after the vet said even the internal organs on the little calico were shriveled from starvation. The cops would not do a damn thing even though the old man told the deputy he would just shoot them to solve it and they demanded back, claimed ownership of, that poor little calico, which killed me, to give her back. They did turn over three to me.

I asked the neighbor what happened to those cats. She claimed they now have no cats and she doesn't know what happened. My guess is they starved to death or that mean old man killed them. Deputy should have done something. That poor little calico.

The woman wanted help with a cat in Scio dumped off at the store, a fluffy cat she said, who had seemed healthy but now is thin and looks sick. She wanted me to take him. I said I couldn't, why doesn't she, or maybe the store could take him to the vet. She said they have too many already and I know that's true, but I can't take in another cat, a sick one. I told her I have too many here and no money or space. She was going to call other places. I doubt SafeHaven would help. They always seem to be full.

I had hoped the grange manager people would be up for helping get the cats fixed who live across the road at the collector hovel, but the grange woman said her husband doesn't want involved at all. So that's that.

An Albany woman forwarded me an e-mail she got, asking for help getting cats fixed. I responded to the woman or man, can't tell which, who claimed his or her ex is responsible for all their unfixed cats, sounds like lots, and she or he might have to shoot one of them, a male. I told him or her they all need fixed and should have been all along and if they're outside city limits, I can still help but will need a copay. I doubt I'll get a response even asking for a $5 copay, but maybe I will.

The homeless campers told me there are tons of kittens and cats unfixed behind Poppa's Pizza in Corvallis right by Heartland. I asked if they'd asked Heartland to help out with getting them fixed and they claim residents have, but I don't know if that's true or not. They have to know, there at Heartland, the situation right there nearby, since the workers drive by it. I would hope Heartland would help out in their neighborhood, too.

I've lost faith in these big shelters, however, anymore. I think getting salaries and such makes a person want to work their hours and go home and that's it.

Someone way up in WA is interested in Shaulin. She said she'd take another kitten, too, as a buddy. She's supposed to be filling out the adoption application. I won't know if this home is a possibility until I get that and call her references, however.

I fell asleep on the couch when I got home. I was supposed to be pet sitting someone's cats this weekend, but the key she gave me for the door doesn't work in the door. I do not have her cell number, as she asked me last minute. I'm not sure what to do. Tomorrow I will try again, to get in some way.

Jeanne barely made it on her flight in Portland. She wanted to get something to eat right before boarding, and smoke a cigarette, which almost meant she didn't get through security and onto that plane. But she made it, she said, with seconds to spare only.

She got to meet another of her online buddies in her Chicago plane change and says she almost missed the plane there as a result. But Keith even brought his cat to the airport to meet her, in the very few minutes they had, between flights. Sounds like that meant a lot to her. She got home ok, because she e-mailed that she had.

It was a long week and I am very exhausted. I suppose what I learned from Jeanne's visit was that next time, if I want a vacation, I need to get away from here, because otherwise it's not really a vacation for me, just increased work. We survived the visit and took a couple of day trips, one to the Reservoir, where Jeanne said she'd need the water about ten degrees warmer to swim. I was thinking, after seeing so many toxic algae outbreaks in Oregon waters, that if the water was ten degrees warmer in Foster, it'd have a toxic algae outbreak, too.

Sharing a place with a stranger was a risk and we did survive it. We had our blow ups over differing sleep schedules and habits, but remain friends. I wanted to show off Oregon and I should have realized the impossibility of doing that in a week, due to the driving times, expense and being older, the inevitible exhaustion that would result from trying to get ready, plan things, do too much. Due to our conflicting sleep schedules and habits, one or the other of us was always tired out and sleeping in, which meant late starts if we were going to do anything.

Jeanne is a nice lady and it was nice to meet her.

Oh well. Live and learn. Now I need to sleep because I am exhausted, totally!